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Sovereignty
By Eric Brahm September 2004

The Concept of Sovereignty

Sovereignty is the central organizing principle of the system of states. However, it is also one of the most poorly understood concepts in international relations. This confusion emerges from at least two sources. First, as will be discussed below, sovereignty is in fact a relatively recent innovation connected to the emergence of the nation-state as the primary unit of political organization. Second, what is more, a number of contemporary issues have placed increasing limits on the exercise of sovereign authority. These two factors raise questions about the fixity of the concept of sovereignty often assumed by international relations scholars. A more sophisticated view of sovereignty now envisions states and nonstate actors as engaged in a continual process of renegotiating the nature of sovereignty.[1]

At its core, sovereignty is typically taken to mean the possession of absolute authority within a bounded territorial space. There is essentially an internal and external dimension of sovereignty. Internally, a sovereign government is a fixed authority with a settled population that possesses a monopoly on the use of force. It is the supreme authority within its territory. Externally, sovereignty is the entry ticket into the society of states. Recognition on the part of other states helps to ensure territorial integrity and is the entree into participating in diplomacy and international organizations on an equal footing with other states.

Historical Development
The international system was not always arranged in terms of sovereign states. Through the Middle Ages alternative feudal arrangements governed Europe and citystates lasted up until the modern period. The development of a system of sovereign states culminated in Europe at the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. This agreement essentially allowed the ruler to determine the religion within his borders, but it also represents both the internal and external aspects of sovereignty. (Internal sovereignty means supreme authority within one's territory, while external sovereignty relates to the recognition on the part of all states that each possesses this power in equal measure.) As Europe colonized much of the rest of the world from the fifteenth through the nineteenth centuries, the state system spread around the globe. Through this time, sovereign authority was clearly not extended to non-Europeans. However, the process of drawing boundaries to clearly demarcate borders would be critical for defining sovereign states during decolonization. The second, current, movement appears to be the gradual circumscription of the sovereign state, which began roughly after World War II and continues to the present. Much of international law, at least until WWII, was designed to reinforce sovereignty. However, driven by the horrors of the Nazi genocide and the lessons of the Nuremberg war crimes tribunal, the society of states forged a series of agreements under the auspices of the United Nations that committed states to protect the human rights of their own citizens, a restriction on authority whiting the state. The post-war period also saw the growth of intergovernmental organizations to help govern interstate relations in areas ranging from trade and monetary policy to security and a host of other issue areas. At the same time, much of the non-Western world gained their independence in the decades after World War II, setting up a scenario in which many of the new states were not fully sovereign.[2] Granting former colonies independence and recognizing them as sovereign states, they joined intergovernmental organizations and were ostensibly the equals of European states. At the same time, there was a general lack of capacity to govern the state, combined with arbitrarily drawn borders, that left different groups leery at best in providing a government with supreme authority. Today, sovereignty is essentially based on borders, not any capacity on the part of governments. This was adopted because it was the only means for so many colonies to become independent quickly.[3] Now, sovereignty also entitles developing states to development assistance. As a result, in many instances, these post-colonial states have lacked the internal dimension of sovereignty.

Contemporary Challenges
Although many see threats to state sovereignty from a wide variety of sources, many of these can be grouped in three broad areas: the rise of human rights, economic globalization, and the growth of supranational institutions, the latter being partially driven by economic integration and the cause of human rights. The emergence of human rights as a subject of concern in international law effects sovereignty because these agreed upon principles place clear limits on the authority of governments to act within their borders. The growth of multinational corporations and the free flow of capital have placed constraints on states' ability to direct economic development and fashion social and economic policy. Finally, both to facilitate and to limit the more troubling effects of these developments, along with a range of other purposes, supranational organizations have emerged as a significant source of authority that, at least to some degree, place limits on state sovereignty. It is too early to tell for certain, but recent US action in Afghanistan and Iraq suggest that sovereignty will be further constrained in the fight against transnational terrorism.

The Protection of Human Rights

The United Nations Charter contains a contradiction that has become ever more troublesome,e particularly after the end of the Cold War. On the one hand, the Charter contains clear defense of the territorial integrity of states, a reaction to Nazi aggression during World War II. At the same time, it also contains commitments to individual human rights and the rights of groups to self-determination. Conventions on genocide, torture, and the like restricted state behavior within its own borders. Regional organizations were articulating human rights principles as well. The growth of human rights law limits sovereignty by providing individuals rights vis-B-vis the state. However, in the context of the Cold War, US-Soviet rivalry paralyzed the Security Council and it rarely acted in defense of these principles. At the same time, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) emerged in the 1960s-70s fighting for the cause of human rights. Groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch serve as watchdogs to publicize the human rights record of governments limiting state action in some ways.[4] The publicity is sometimes enough to alter state behavior. At other times, the information serves to prompt other states to apply diplomatic pressure, economic sanctions, and increasingly common to contemplate humanitarian intervention. In the 1990s, the Security Council began to reinterpret the Charter to more frequently favor human rights over the protection of state sovereignty. Through a series of resolutions, the United Nations has justified intervention in the internal affairs of states without their acquiescence.[5] In cases such as Somalia, Bosnia, and Kosovo, the Security Council has gradually expanded the definition of international threats to peace and security to justify intervention in circumstances that would have been inconceivable in the past. At the same time, as these cases and Rwanda show, states are often only willing to risk their troops when there is some national interest at stake. There is also great reluctance to interpret any of these instances as precedent-setting as states fear they may be the target of intervention in the future.

Economic Globalization
For many, economic globalization places significant limits on the behavior of nationstates at present. For those who see the retreat of the nation-state, the growing power of unaccountable market forces and international organizations provokes calls for change.[6] As will be further elaborated below, the growth of multilateral institutions to manage the global economy constrains state action.[7] The increasing mobility of capital has led states to pursue increasingly similar policies along the neo-liberal model.[8] Given the intensification of global competition, government spending and revenue-generation are increasingly constrained.[9] While some do not go so far as to declare the end of the welfare state, many see a worldwide convergence toward a more limited welfare state.[10] Others find that, while the tasks of the state may be changing, the state very much remains the key driver of globalization processes.[11] That is not to say that all states have equal influence in the process. Nor can the outcomes be reduced to strictly positive or negative because the multitude of processes involved impact different states in different ways.[12]

Supranational Organizations
Given the emergence of a whole range of transborder issues from economic globalization to the environment to terrorism, one of the key discussions surrounds whether the nation-state is obsolete as the best form of political organization to deal with these problems. Economic and social processes increasingly fail to conform to nation-state borders, making it increasingly difficult for states to control their territory, a central component of sovereignty. This raises important questions about the proper site of political authority. As governance structures are established at the global level to deal with the growing number of global problems, debate has ensued as to how to make these arrangements accountable and democratic. Many organizations are state-based, such as the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, or the European Union. Therefore, in principle, states are firmly in control and any ceding of sovereign authority is in their interest to do so. However, bureaucracies, once established, often seek to carve out additional authority for themselves. States also may find functional benefit in ceding authority to supranational organizations.[13] What is more, a whole range of private organizations have emerged to infringe on sovereign authority as well. In addition to human rights NGOs discussed above, global civil society organizations have emerged around numerous issues. Civil society groups have had a growing, yet uneven, effect on nation-states and international organizations.[14] In addition, as economic interdependence grows, private governance arrangements, such as the Bank for International Settlements, are also becoming more prevalent.[15] Private security organizations even conduct war on behalf of states, whether as mercenaries in western African civil wars or as contractors to the US military around the world.[16] Together all of this suggests that the concept of sovereignty is under considerable pressure. Some aspects of sovereignty still exist and are honored in most circumstances, but many inroads are being made into state authority by many actors in many different circumstances. Where this will lead has yet to be determined

[1] Biersteker, T. J. and C. Weber, Eds. (1996). State sovereignty as social construct. New York: Cambridge University Press. [2] Krasner, S. 1996. Compromising Westphalia. International Security. 20(3): 47296. [3] Jackson, R. H. (1990). Quasi-states: sovereignty, international relations, and the Third World. New York: Cambridge University Press. [4] Sikkink, K. (1993). "Human-Rights, Principled Issue-Networks, and Sovereignty in Latin-America." International Organization 47(3): 411-441. [5] Nicholas J. Wheeler. 2000. Saving Strangers. New York: Oxford University Press. [6] Khor, M. 1999. Rethinking Globalization: Critical Issues and Policy Choices. New York: Zed Books.; Korten, D. 1996. When Corporations Rule the World. Bloomfield CT: Kumarian Press. [7] Ohmae, K. 1995. The End of the Nation State. New York: Free Press.; Reich, R. 1991. The Work of Nations. New York: Simon and Schuster.; Rosenau, J.N. 1997. Along the Domestic-Foreign Frontier. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.; Sassen, S. 1996. Losing Control? Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization. New York: Columbia University Press. [8] Amin, S. 1997. Capitalism in the Age of Globalization. London: Zed Press.; Gill, S. 1995. Globalization, Market Civilization and Disciplinary Neoliberalism. Millennium. 24(3).; Greider, W. 1997. One World, Ready or Not: The Manic Logic of Global Capitalism. New York: Simon and Schuster.; Hoogvelt, A. 1997. Globalization and the Postcolonial World: The New Political Economy of Development. London: Macmillan.; Luttwak, E. 1999. Turbo-Capitalism. New York: Basic Books.; Scholte, J.A. 1997. Global Capitalism and the State. International Affairs. 73(3): 427-452.; Strange, S. 1996. The Retreat of the State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.; Yergin, D.A. and Stanislaw, J. 1998. The Commanding Heights. New York: Simon and Schuster. [9] Cox, R. 1997. Economic Globalization and the Limits to Liberal Democracy. In A. McGrew. ed. The Transformation of Democracy? Globalization and Territorial Democracy. Cambridge: Polity Press.; Frieden, J. 1991. Invested Interests: The Politics of National Economic Policies in a World of Global Finance. International Organization. 45(4).; Garrett, G. and Lange, P. 1991. Political Responses to Interdependence: What's "Left" for the Left? International Organization. 45(4).; Gourevitch, P. 1986. Politics in Hard Times. New York: Cornell University Press.; Gray, J. 1998. False Dawn: The Delusions of Global Capitalism. New York: The New Press.; Greider 1997; Reich 1991; Scholte 1997. [10] Gourevitch 1986; Gray 1998; Pieper, U. and Taylor, L. 1998. The Revival of the Liberal Creed: The IMF, the World Bank and Inequality in a Globalized Economy. In D. Baker, G. Epstein and R. Podin. eds. Globalization and Progressive Economic Policy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.; Rodrik, D. 1997. Sense and Nonsense in the Globalization Debate. Foreign Policy. (Summer). [11] Evans, P. 1997. The Eclipse of the State' World Politics 50: 62-87.; Garrett, G. 1998. Global Markets and National Politics: Collision Course or Virtuous Circle'

International Organization. 52(4): 787-824. [12] Mann, M. 1997. Has Globalization Ended the Rise of the Nation-State?" Review of International Political Economy. 4(3): 472-96. [13] Haas, E. B. (1961). "International Integration: The European and the Universal Process." International Organization 15(3): 366-392.; Mitrany, D. (1943). A working peace system; an argument for the functional development of international organization. London, The Royal Institute of International Affairs. [14] Meyer, J.W., Boli, J., Thomas, G.M., and Ramirez, F.O. 1997. World Society and the Nation-State. American Journal of Sociology. 103(1): 144-81.; O'Brien, R., Goetz, A.M., Scholte, J.A., and Williams, M. 2000. Contesting Global Governance: Multilateral Institutions and Global Social Movements. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [15] Picciotto, S. 1996. The Regulatory Criss-Cross: Interaction Between Jurisdictions and the Construction of Global Regulatory Networks. In W. Bratton et al. eds. International Regulatory Competition and Coordination. Oxford: Clarendon. pp. 89-123.; Reinicke, W.H. 1998. Global Public Policy: Governing Without Government. Washington, D.C.: Bookings. [16] P.W. Singer. 2001/02. Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry and Its Ramifications for International Security. International Security. 26(3): 186-220. Use the following to cite this article: Brahm, Eric. "Sovereignty." Beyond Intractability. Eds. Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess. Conflict Research Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Posted: September 2004 <http://www.beyondintractability.org/essay/sovereignty/>.

Sources of Additional, In-depth Information on this Topic

Additional Explanations of the Underlying Concepts:
Online (Web) Sources Tok?r, Adrian. Something Happened: Sovereignty and European Integration. Available at: http://www.iwm.at/publ-jvc/jc-11-02.pdf. "The purpose of this study is to show, as its title suggests, that something happened to the notion of sovereignty in Europe after the creation and development of what is now the European Community and European Union. There is some important development under way that does not allow us to look at sovereignty of EU member states the same way we would do if there were no integration. This includes mainly the abolition of internal frontiers, the creation of a supranational legal system and the introduction of the concept of a European citizenship." Philpott, Daniel. Sovereignty.

Available at: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sovereignty/. This site provides an overview of what sovereignty is, its historical evolution, and a host of resources for further information. Falk, Richard. "Sovereignty and Human Rights: The Search for Reconciliation." , May 2000 Available at: http://usinfo.state.gov/journals/itdhr/0500/ijde/falk.htm. This article covers the complicated relationship between national sovereignty and human rights in an article that raises important questions about the degree to which democracy should be promoted around the world. The author indicates that the choices are by no means easy or clear. Pellet, Alain. State sovereignty and the protection of fundamental human rights: an international law perspective. Available at: http://www.pugwash.org/reports/rc/pellet.htm. "THE purpose of this very brief paper is to show that sovereignty, properly defined, is not a defence for breaches of gross violations of fundamental human rights. It has never been such, and today it is less a defence than ever." Offline (Print) Sources Bartelson, Jens. A genealogy of sovereignty. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995. The concept of sovereignty is central to international relations theory and theories of the state and provides the foundation of the conventional separation of modern politics into domestic and international spheres. In this book Jens Bartelson provides a critical analysis and conceptual history of sovereignty, dealing with philosophical and political texts during three periods: the Renaissance, the Classical Age, and Modernity. He argues that sovereignty should be regarded as a concept contingent upon, rather than fundamental to, political science and its history. - Amazon Lyons, Gene M. and Michael Mastanduno. Beyond Westphalia? State Sovereignty and International Intervention. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, April 1, 1995. This book contrasts the 'realist' and the 'globalist' approaches to international order. Specifically it covers issues relating to state sovereignty, autonomy, and equality in the current context of nationalist movements. Krasner, Stephen D. "Compromising Westphalia." International Security 20:3, 1996. The Westphalian model views the internaitonal system as composed of sovereign states having exclusive authority within specified geographic boundaries. The model is used as a benchmark for affirmation of fading sovereignty in the modern world. However, analysis shows that the model does not accurately describe entities whic hare regarded as states and is misleading in its assumption that states are independent rational entities. Singer, P.W. "Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry

and Its Ramifications for International Security." International Security 26:3, 2001. This article discusses the recent growth of corporation involvement in the conduct of war. Drawing upon examples from mercenary security companies in Sierra Leone to outsourcing in the US military, the article seeks to distinguish current trends from past involvement of private militaries and discusses the implications for international security. Sikkink, Kathryn. "Human Rights, Principled Issue Networks, and Sovereignty in Latin America." International Organization 47:3, 1993. International relations theorists have devoted insufficient attention to the processes through which state sovereignty is being transformed in the modern world. The human rights issue offers a case study of a gradual and significant reconceptualization of state sovereignty. In the human rights issue-area, the primary movers behind the international actions leading to changing understandings of sovereignty are transnational nonstate actors organized in a principled issue-network, including international and domestic nongovernmental organizations, parts of global and regional intergovernmental organizations, and private foundations. These networks differ from other forms of transnational relations in that they are driven primarily by shared values or principled ideas. Through a comparative study of the impact of international human rights pressures on Argentina and Mexico in the 1970s and 1980s, this article explores the emergence and the nature of the principled human rights issue-network and the conditions under which it can contribute to changing both state understandings about sovereignty and state human rights practices. Sassen, Saskia. Losing Control? Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization. New York: Columbia University Press, 1996. Examining the rise of private transnational legal codes and supranational institutions such as the World Trade Organization and universal human rights covenants, Sassen argues that sovereignty remains an important feature of the international system, but that it is no longer confined to the nation-state. Sassen argues that a profound transformation is taking place, a partial denationalizing of national territory seen in such agreements as NAFTA and the European Union. Two arenas stand out in the new spatial and economic order: the global capital market and the series of codes and institutions that have mushroomed into an international human rights regime. As Sassen shows, these two quasi-legal realms now have the power and legitimacy to demand accountability from national governments with the ironic twist that both depend upon the state to enforce their goals. Jackson, Robert H. Quasi-states: sovereignty, international relations, and the Third World. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Robert Jackson examines the birth and survival of Third World nations since the end of the Second World War. He describes these countries as "quasi-states," arguing that they exist more by the support and indulgence of the international community than by the abilities and efforts of their own governments and peoples. He investigates the international normative framework that upholds sovereign statehood in the Third World. This he calls "negative sovereignty" and contrasts it with what he sees as the "positive sovereignty" that emerged in Europe along with the modern state. Within

this structure, he examines how negative sovereignty arose, and its mechanisms and consequences for both international politics and the domestic conditions of quasistates. He concludes by assessing the future of quasi-states and the institution of negative sovereignty. --Amazon Philpott, Daniel. Revolutions in Sovereignty: How Ideas Shaped Modern International Relations. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001. The author argues that although many factors have influenced the creation of sovereign nations, the most important ones are ideas. The two he focuses on are the Protestant Reformation and the Peace of Westphalia, which created sovereign nations in Europe, as well as ideas developed in the 1960s about equality and colonialism, which allowed for the formation of sovereign nations throughout the world. Krasner, Stephen D. Sovereignty: Organized Hypocrisy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999. The acceptance of human rights and minority rights, the increasing role of international financial institutions, and globalization have led many observers to question the continued viability of the sovereign state. Krasner contends that states have never been as sovereign as some have supposed. Throughout history, rulers have been motivated by a desire to stay in power, not by some abstract adherence to international principles. Organized hypocrisy--the presence of longstanding norms that are frequently violated--has been an enduring attribute of international relations. Political leaders have usually but not always honored international legal sovereignty, the principle that international recognition should be accorded only to juridically independent sovereign states, while treating Westphalian sovereignty, the principle that states have the right to exclude external authority from their own territory, in a much more provisional way. In some instances violations of the principles of sovereignty have been coercive, as in the imposition of minority rights on newly created states after the First World War or the successor states of Yugoslavia after 1990; at other times cooperative, as in the European Human Rights regime or conditionality agreements with the International Monetary Fund. Differences in national power and interests, he concludes, not international norms, continue to be the most powerful explanation for the behavior of states.-Amazon Biersteker, Thomas J. and Cynthia Weber. State sovereignty as social construct. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. State sovereignty is an inherently social construct. The modern state system is not based on some timeless principle of sovereignty, but on the production of a normative conception that links authority, territory, population, and recognition in a unique way, and in a particular place (the state). The unique contribution of this book is to describe and illustrate the practices that have produced various sovereign ideals and resistances to them. The contributors analyze how the components of state sovereignty are socially constructed and combined in specific historical contexts. Hashmi, Sohail H., ed. State sovereignty: change and persistence in international relations. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997. In what ways is the concept of sovereignty changing today? Where is this change leading us - toward further international integration or toward greater subnational

fragmentation? What will be the implications of this change for international security, peace, and justice? Will the emergence of new sovereign states for old ethnic groups lead the world toward greater order and justice or, rather, toward greater anarchy, violence and repression? The seven essays in this volume address these issues from historical, political, legal, ethical and sociological perspectives. Moreover, they survey applications of sovereignty in the West European, post-Communist, Islamic, and East Asian contexts. Spruyt, Hendrik. The Sovereign State and Its Competitors. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994. The present international system, composed for the most part of sovereign, territorial states, is often viewed as the inevitable outcome of historical development. Hendrik Spruyt argues that there was nothing inevitable about the rise of the state system, however. Examining the competing institutions that arose during the decline of feudalism--among them urban leagues, independent communes, city states, and sovereign monarchies--Spruyt disposes of the familiar claim that the superior size and war-making ability of the sovereign nation-state made it the natural successor to the feudal system. The author argues that feudalism did not give way to any single successor institution in simple linear fashion. Instead, individuals created a variety of institutional forms, such as the sovereign, territorial state in France, the Hanseatic League, and the Italian city-states, in reaction to a dramatic change in the medieval economic environment. Only in a subsequent selective phase of institutional evolution did sovereign, territorial authority prove to have significant institutional advantages over its rivals. Sovereign authority proved to be more successful in organizing domestic society and structuring external affairs. Spruyt's interdisciplinary approach not only has important implications for change in the state system in our time, but also presents a novel analysis of the general dynamics of institutional change. Cronin, B. and J.S. Barkin. "The State and the Nation - Changing Norms and the Rules of Sovereignty in International Relations." International Organization 48:1, 1994. There is a historical tension between state sovereignty, which stresses the link between sovereign authority and a defined territory, and national sovereignty, which emphasizes a link between sovereignty and a defined population. These fundamentally differ in the source of their legitimation, thereby altering the environment through which states interact. Should the state emphasis predominate, international borders will be seen as territorially determined. Should the nationalist emphasis predominate, the international community will see states as tied to specifically defined populations and as territorially malleable. The legitimacy of the nation-state in a particular era is determined largely by the principles around which the winning coalition unites during a great war. These principles cannot be objectively deduced from the nature of the states or the structure of the system, but must be induced from two variables: the political dynamics of the coalition-building process and the intersubjective consensus among coalition members as to the war's cause. Consequently, sovereignty should be viewed as a variable rather than as a constant.

Philpott, Daniel. "Usurping the sovereignty of sovereignty?." World Politics 53:2, 2001. Stephen Krasner's "Sovereignty" and Michael Ross Fowler and Julie Marie Bunck's "Law, Power, and the Sovereign State" together pose the deepest challenge yet to the assumption of sovereignty in international relations scholarship. Both claim not merely that state sovereignty is now compromised but also that it has always been severely truncated, violated, and curtailed. Both works contribute importantly to the field by amassing and cataloging formidable evidence of compromises of sovereignty. Yet by failing to provide a yardstick by which to compare these compromises with states' comparative respect for sovereignty, both works ultimately fail to sustain their thesis. Both also overlook the constitutive dimension of sovereignty, a dimension whose acknowledgment would render sovereignty far more stable than either admits. By contrast, a third work, Rodney Bruce Hall's National Collective Identity, commendably explores the constitutive role of sovereignty and applies it to the development of the nation-state system. The strengths and weaknesses of all three works help set an agenda for future scholarship on sovereignty.
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Examples Illustrating this Topic:

Online (Web) Sources Eyewitness Accounts: Genocide in Bangladesh. Bosnia and East Timor Pages. Available at: http://www.globalwebpost.com/genocide1971/witness/witness.htm. An eyewitness tells how coercive power was used against Bangladeshi who were seeking sovereignty from Pakistan.
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Beyond Intractability Version IV Copyright 2003-2010 The Beyond Intractability Project Beyond Intractability is a Registered Trademark of the University of Colorado Project Acknowledgements The Beyond Intractability Knowledge Base Project Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess, Co-Directors and Editors c/o Conflict Information Consortium (Formerly Conflict Research Consortium), University of Colorado Campus Box 580, Boulder, CO 80309 Phone: (303) 492-1635; Fax: (303) 492-2154; Contact